Catching Sounds with the iPhone

By Phillip L. Graitcer on November 19, 2008 12:28 PM

Recording sounds on the iPhone has recently become as easy as taking pictures. Get the baby's first sounds, the bar band doing their encore, or add audio to your blog. Recording on an iPhone might even help a reporter on deadline. There are several programs that enable recording available at the iPhone store. We've chosen two, iTalk and iProRecorder, that are simple to use yet allow professional quality recordings.

iTalk by Griffin
This free application (an ad-free version is available for $.99 known as iTalk Premium) is more than a voice recorder. It can record high quality sounds that can be saved for replay on the iPhone or can be imported to your computer using Wi-Fi and drag and drop for further editing, burning to a CD, or e-mailing.

To transfer audio files to your computer you will need to also download on your computer a free program from Griffin. This program, when launched, will detect your iPhone, and once you confirm access on your iPhone the program will allow you to drag and drop audio files directly to your computer.

Three qualities of recording levels are available (Good/Better/Best). The Best level is high quality audio, suitable for broadcast.

iTalk has a nice interface and is compatible with the iPhone, iPhone 3G, or 2nd generation iPod Touch (requires a stereo headset).

iProRecorder by BIAS
This $.99 application also allows you to make high quality recordings. iPro has a beautiful interface and recording and playback is done with a simple one-touch. BIAS (see bottom image) is a well known audio software company and this program is a useful adjunct.

While iPro is more than a voice recorder and has several slick features, including a beautiful interface, transferring audio files to your computer is not simple or fast. There are three ways to do this:

1) Via e-mail - just type in the address and the file transfers, but the files are not sent directly to an email address, they are uploaded to BIAS' server and then resent to the email address you specified. Sound files are big files and emailing even ones that are 30 seconds long can take several minutes.

2) Via Wi-Fi web sharing - If the local web sharing option is checked, a web address appears in iPro. Type that you're your computer browser on your computer and screen directory appears [see image iPro2]. The sound file can be downloaded.

3) The audio file can also be sent directly to a BIAS sound editing program called PEAK via Wi-Fi. PEAK is a basic sound editing program that runs on your computer, but it now costs $39.00. (It was initially offered for $19.00).

Summary
Both programs offer a simple and easy to use way to record audio with your iPhone. They definately have the potential to be used "in a pinch" to capture sound for professional radio broadcast, and they could be extremely useful for radio reporters and podcasters.

Note to Recordists
Audio recorded on the 1st Generation iPhone is NOT ACCEPTABLE for audio broadcast. Users of the 3G iPhone will be able to make recordings that could be used on the air. The microphones used in the two phones are not the same and this probably accounts for the difference in audio quality.

But if your only application is note taking or even audio blogging, the quality of the recordings on the 1st Generation phone is satisfactory.